Okay place to work, but the fun has died. - Anonymous employee liveBooks Employee Review

4.0
15 Apr 2010
Anonymous employee
Recommend
CEO approval
Business outlook

Pros

Highly competent people, who are fun to work with and easy to get along with. Location in the heart of San Francisco isn't too shabby. Everyone has high-end Macs and multiple monitors to use. Friendly, prompt, and good-quality helpdesk and production IT support services. Interesting challenges to work on solving, and an overall pleasant environment within which to work.

Cons

Very top heavy, almost a 1:1 ratio of managers to individual contributors. Frequent micromanagement, with senior managers trying to exert control over things they don't understand but refuse to delegate. Managers never have 1:1 meetings with their direct reports, company never buys anyone lunch, and praise or thanks is never given out except on an employee's last day. Complete lack of technical direction in the company, with multiple CTOs hired and fired over the past few years. Fully-outsourced development makes communication difficult due to vast timezone differences. Core product is years out of date, customers are leaving due to this, yet efforts to address this are 99% talk and 1% action.

Explore other reviews about liveBooks

4.0
23 Apr 2015
Recommend
CEO approval
Business outlook

Pros

work with great people, nice office with good size kitchen and all you can drink coffee/tea. great products to support.

Cons

Too bad the CEO wanted to expand too fast and furiously. Ended up bankrupting the company and had to let 90% of its people go. However, he was a great boss.

2.0
19 Apr 2013
Anonymous employee
Recommend
CEO approval
Business outlook

Pros

Fun brand in a creative field. Start up environment. Competitive compensation.

Cons

Too much management. Most who have no idea what they are talking about or even know what you do... they just want it done NOW! Always rushing into projects without understanding the time and sweat that will need to go into them. Not appreciative of your efforts. Poor benefits. Lack or culture and moral. Too much focus on the dollar signs with promises or things "getting better". So much big company name dropping to keep people strung along.

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